Aesthetics, as a discipline, has evolved to deal primarily with the experience and
evaluation of sensory perceptions, especially in relation to artworks. Traditionally a
subfield of philosophy and a concern of the different disciplines related to the specific
art forms, such as literary studies, musicology, and art history, the latter part of the 19th
century witnessed the development of a new, empirical approach to the questions of
aesthetics. This empirical approach originated out of the then emerging field of
experimental psychology, and today psychological aesthetics still dominates the
empirical branch of aesthetic research. However, an engagement of this psychological
approach with the ongoing debates and research in the humanities is (unfortunately)
rarely entertained.

The Max Planck Institute for Empirical Aesthetics (founded in 2013) seeks to implement
a genuinely interdisciplinary approach to the study of aesthetics with special emphasis
on language/literature and music. Psychological findings, methods, and paradigms will
play an important role in this context. In order to provide a forum where desiderata,
promising topics, empirical and experimental methods and interdisciplinary
perspectives can be identified and discussed, we are hosting a workshop to which we
invite colleagues with a background in any relevant field of psychology (e.g. perception,
emotion, cognition, development, social) and a serious interest in matters of aesthetics.
We welcome short abstracts that either present ongoing research, evaluate and discuss
certain research fields or outline ideas for possible future research.

We are seeking highly motivated post-doctoral fellows to participate in a research program that tests the neural bases of sound perception. This research will be conducted at the University of Pennsylvania. The goals of these projects are to test the contribution of various regions of the auditory cortex and prefrontal cortex to sound perception in non-human primates.

Candidates should have a PhD. Those with an MD will be considered but only if the candidates have a strong scientific background. A strong candidate will have experience in systems and computational neuroscience; recording and analysis of single- and multi-unit activity and local-field potentials from awake, behaving animals (in particular non-human primates); experience in training animals on operant tasks; analysis of behavioral data and electrophysiological data; computational-analysis skills; and programming skills. We are interested in individuals who have a good personality and can interact well with other members of the laboratory.

The positions are funded through two new R01s and are available immediately. One of the grants is funded to Yale Cohen. The second is funded to both Yale Cohen and Yonatan Fishman.

Salary will be based on experience and the NIH post-doctoral scale.

The University of Pennsylvania has an outstanding environment for neuroscience; in particular, systems and computational neuroscience. The environment is further enriched by the PIs’ ongoing collaborations with other members of the Penn Neuroscience community.

For more information or to apply, contact Yale Cohen (YaleECohen@gmail.com) or Yon Fishman (yonatan.fishman@einstein.yu.edu). Interested applicants should send a CV; a brief statement of research interests; and names of 2-3 referees.

Thursday, June 26, 2014

The mirror neuron / embodied cognition camp promotes what appears to be a simple mechanism for aspects of neural processing, variously termed simulation, direct matching, direct perception, or resonance. Oztop, Kawato, and & Arbib 2006 have an excellent comment on the use of such terms in the context of non-computationally explicit (i.e., verbal or conceptual) models. Read it twice and let it sink in. It's right on the mark.

A general pitfall in conceptual modeling is that an innocent looking phrase thrown in the description may render the model implausible or trivial from a computational perspective, hiding the real difficulty of the problem. For example, terms like “direct matching” and “resonance” are used as if they were atomic processes that allow one to build hypotheses about higher cognitive functions of mirror neurons.

The Brown University Department of Cognitive, Linguistic and Psychological Sciences announces a 2 year Visiting position at the Assistant Professor level in Linguistics/Language Processing at or above the word level, beginning September 1, 2014 or January 1, 2015. This includes syntactic, lexical, semantic, and/or pragmatic (including discourse) processing.

Qualifications

Expertise at the intersection of theoretical and experimental approaches is expected, and the successful candidate will be able to teach, conduct and supervise experimental research engaging theoretical issues in linguistics and cognitive science of language. Applicants should be able to teach both introductory courses and advanced courses in language processing and psycholinguistics. While not required, ability and willingness to teach an introductory course in syntax is highly desirable.

Application Instructions

Applications will be considered on a rolling basis, starting July 8, until the position is filled.

Curriculum vitae, reprints and preprints of publications, a maximum two-page statement of research and teaching interests, and three letters of reference should be submitted at <http://apply.interfolio.com/25176>.

Monday, June 23, 2014

A Postdoctoral position is available in the Language
Neuroscience Laboratory (PI: Stephen M. Wilson) at the University of Arizona.
The successful applicant will play a key role on an NIH-funded project
investigating the neural correlates of recovery from aphasia after acute
stroke.

A Ph.D. is required in a relevant field, such as Speech,
Language, and Hearing Sciences, Cognitive Neuroscience, or Psychology. The
ideal candidate will have (1) experience working with individuals with acquired
language impairments, and (2) experience in conducting neuroimaging studies
(e.g. fMRI, DTI, VLSM). However candidates who are exceptionally strong in one
of these two areas, and show potential to learn in the other, will be
considered. Excellent interpersonal skills are critical, since the position
will involve significant interaction with patients, family members, and health
professionals. A record of research productivity is highly desirable.
Programming skills are desirable but not essential.

Research in the Language Neuroscience Laboratory is focused
on the neural basis of language function, how language breaks down in patients
with different kinds of aphasia, and the neural changes that support recovery.
Our approach combines multimodal neuroimaging with quantitative assessments of
language function. We have access to two recently installed and fully equipped
Siemens Skyra 3-Tesla scanners (one for inpatients and one dedicated to research).
The UA Medical Center has a Joint Commission-certified Primary Stroke Center
that sees approximately 300 stroke patients per year. The University of Arizona
has a long history of leadership in aphasia research, and the successful
candidate will have opportunities to collaborate with an interdisciplinary
group of researchers from Speech, Language, and Hearing Sciences, Neurology,
and Medical Imaging. For more information about the lab and our collaborators,
please visit http://neuroling.arizona.edu.

Salary will be commensurate with experience, and is expected
to be consistent with NIH NRSA stipends. The anticipated start date is
September 1, 2014, but is flexible. The position is open until filled.

To apply, please send a letter of interest, a CV, up to three
representative publications, and contact information for two references, to
Stephen M. Wilson .

Research Coordinator/Lab Manager, Language Neuroscience
Laboratory, University of Arizona

A Research Coordinator/Lab Manager position is available in
the Language Neuroscience Laboratory (PI: Stephen M. Wilson) at the University
of Arizona. The successful applicant will work on an NIH-funded project
investigating the neural correlates of recovery from aphasia after acute
stroke, using multimodal neuroimaging and behavioral evaluations of language
function. The position will involve significant interaction with patients,
family members, and health professionals.

Required qualifications:

- A bachelors degree, ideally in a relevant field such as
Speech, Language, and Hearing Sciences, Neuroscience, Psychology, Linguistics
or Physiology (other fields will also be considered)

- Experience working with individuals with neurological
conditions in research or clinical contexts

Research in the Language Neuroscience Laboratory is focused
on the neural basis of language function, how language breaks down in patients
with different kinds of aphasia, and the neural changes that support recovery.
The University of Arizona has a long history of leadership in aphasia research,
and the successful candidate will work with an interdisciplinary group of
researchers from Speech, Language, and Hearing Sciences, Neurology, and Medical
Imaging. For more information about the lab and our collaborators, please visit
http://neuroling.arizona.edu.

Salary will be commensurate with experience. Full benefits
are included. The anticipated start date is September 1, 2014, but is flexible.
The position is open until filled.

To apply, please send a letter of interest, a CV, and
contact information for three references, to Stephen M. Wilson
.

Saturday, June 21, 2014

On 1 January 2014, Psychonomic Bulletin & Review began a slow transition to a new editorial team. It will take a full year to complete the transition and probably longer than that to start noticing differences in the content of the journal. But keep on eye on PBR because we've got some interesting special issues in the works: one that presents a set of critical perspectives on embodied cognition, one on language evolution, another on perceptual interface theory, and lot's more in the planning stages. Also look for a very interesting review paper on animal mind reading by Cecelia Heyes.

PBR is already a forum for strong, rigorous brief reports and theory/review papers. The change involves broadening its scope and an emphasis on integrative approaches. I personally believe that psychology (broadly construed) is too fractionated. There are all kinds of potentially enlightening connections between areas that go unnoticed because we don't look across domains or methods often enough. It's time to build a more integrated science of the mind.

So, here is a preview of the new scope statement for the journal and our editorial board. The action editors are a fantastic group who put a lot of careful thought into each manuscript. They've also worked hard to speed up review times, if that's important to you (of course it is!).

Psychonomic Bulletin & Review scope statement: The journal provides coverage spanning a broad spectrum of topics in all areas of experimental psychology. The journal is primarily dedicated to the publication of theory and review articles and brief reports of outstanding experimental work. Areas of coverage include cognitive psychology broadly construed, including but not limited to action, perception, & attention, language, learning & memory, reasoning & decision making, and social cognition. We welcome submissions that approach these issues from a variety of perspectives such as behavioral measurements, comparative psychology, development, evolutionary psychology, genetics, neuroscience, and quantitative/computational modeling. We particularly encourage integrative research that crosses traditional content and methodological boundaries.

Editor-in-Chief

Gregory Hickok, University of California, IrvineAssociate EditorsJessica Cantlon, University of RochesterGreig de Zubicaray, University of QueenslandStephen D. Goldinger, Arizona State University Antonia Hamilton, University College LondonMarc Howard, Boston University John Serences, University of California, San DiegoSarah Shomstein, George Washington UniversityMark Steyvers, University of California, Irvine

We've also brought in some new consulting editors to reflect our broadened scope including:

Friday, June 20, 2014

Rita Sloan Berndt passed away on Tuesday. Rita was an internationally recognized scholar and researcher, dedicated to the understanding of aphasia and its devastating effects on language communication. She was a true force in the field with a research program that was broad in scope. While she focused particularly on deficits in sentence comprehension and production in aphasia, she also examined impairments in reading, lexico-semantics, and category-specific naming. Although Rita published some of the first papers hypothesizing a general syntactic deficit in agrammatic Broca’s aphasia, she was also among the first to challenge this view through careful single case studies, buttressed by group studies, meta-analyses, and the implementation of treatment protocols focused on the processing of verbs and their arguments. Rita’s research was supported continuously for 22 years by the National Institutes of Health, testimony to its importance and high quality. She published extensively from the 1970’s until 2009 in top journals in the field, and edited or co-edited 4 books. She had collaborators world-wide and enriched many a meeting of the Academy of Aphasia with her thoughtful and intellectually rich presentations and with her provocative (in the best sense) comments and questions. Her working style was and is something to emulate: low-key, focused, curious, open to questions, and collegial. Rita was a great researcher, collaborator, colleague, and friend. She will be sorely missed.

Sunday, June 1, 2014

2
Postdoctoral positions in Bilingualism in the BCBL (AThEME collaborative
research project)

The Basque Center on Cognition Brain and Language
(San Sebastián, Basque Country, Spain) offers 2 postdoctoral positions in
Bilingualism to work on the collaborative research projectAThEME - “Advancing the European Multilingual Experience” funded by the European
Commission 7th Framework Programme that comprises 16 Research partners
(universities, research centers and SMEs) located in 8 European countries.

The positions
have a term of appointment of 2 years with a possible renewal.

·to
assess existing public policies and practices within the areas of education and
health and their impact on multilingualism

·to
contribute to evidence-based policy-making

THE CENTER AND THE BENEFITS

The Fellows will join one of the AThEME partners, the BCBL (Basque Center on Cognition, Brain and
Language – www.bcbl.eu) and will focus his/her research in WP 4 and WP5.

·WP4 addresses the complex
issues associated with multilingualism
in acquired communicative disorders. In particular we will concentrate our
efforts on the impact of bilingualism on the language learning performance of
dyslexic children.

·WP5 will investigate several
factors that contribute to what it means to “Being Bilingual” and the BCBL
will focus on the bilingual population in the Basque Country. In particular we
will investigate (1) language attrition, that is, the impact of a second
reading system on the first reading system, (2) the putative advantages of
bilinguals on the cognitive system and (3) the potential benefits of
multilingualism on the decline of the cognitive system during aging.

The Center promotes a rich research environment without
teaching obligations. It provides access to the most advanced behavioral and
neuroimaging techniques, including 3 Tesla MRI, a whole-head MEG system, four
ERP labs, a NIRS lab, a baby lab including an eyetracker, two eyetracking labs,
and several well-equipped behavioral labs.There are excellent technical support staff and research personnel (PhD
and postdoctoral students).

REQUIREMENTS

We are looking for cognitive neuroscientists or
experimental psychologists with a background in Psycholinguistics, Linguistics,
Psychology, or Cognitive Neuroscience, an excellent command of English.
Advanced skills in neuroimaging methods are desirable. We expect a strong
interest for and motivation to work on the interplay of language, language
disorders, bilingualism and multilingualism, the willingness to invest in interdisciplinary
collaboration, and the ability to work in teams. Candidates should have a
strong publication track record.

HOW TO APPLY

Candidates should send their application by JUNE
30, 2014. To submit your application please sign into the system (http://www.bcbl.eu/login) and upload:

3.The
names of two referees who would be willing to write letters of recommendation

For further
information about the positions, please contact Manuel Carreiras (info@bcbl.eu)

AThEME
- “Advancing the European Multilingual Experience” is a collaborative research
project funded by the European Union Seventh Framework Programme
(FP7/2007-2013) under grant agreement no. 613465, research area FP7-SSH-2013-1,
topic SSH.2013.5.2-1: The multilingual challenge for the European citizen.

1
Postdoctoral position in Bilingualism in the BCBL to work on the project

Learning
to read in two alphabets: typical development and reading disorders

The Basque Center on Cognition Brain and Language
(San Sebastián, Basque Country, Spain) offers 1 postdoctoral position in
Bilingualism to work on the research project“Learning to
read in two alphabets: typical development and reading disorders”

The position
has a term of appointment of 3 years with a possible renewal.

This project addresses challenges related to the
development of reading skills.One
general objective is to understand school failure when children have to face
learning in two alphabets, and how this phenomenon can be linked to reading deficits.
Equally important, we also seek to develop insight about the factors that help
many children succeed. The main goal of the project is to study the mechanisms
of literacy acquisition in two alphabets (Arabic and Roman) and investigate the
relationships between reading difficulties (dyslexia) in two very different
languages (Arabic, English) that employ different alphabets (Arabic, Roman).

THE CENTER AND THE BENEFITS

The Fellow will join the BCBL (Basque Center on Cognition, Brain and Language – www.bcbl.eu). The
Center promotes a rich research environment without teaching obligations. It
provides access to the most advanced behavioral and neuroimaging techniques,
including 3 Tesla MRI, a whole-head MEG system, four ERP labs, a NIRS lab, a
baby lab including an eyetracker, two eyetracking labs, and several
well-equipped behavioral labs.There are
excellent technical support staff and research personnel (PhD and postdoctoral
students).

REQUIREMENTS

We are looking for cognitive neuroscientists or
experimental psychologists with a background in Psycholinguistics, Linguistics,
Psychology, or Cognitive Neuroscience, an excellent command of English and
Arabic. Advanced skills in neuroimaging methods are desirable (not mandatory).
We expect a strong interest for and motivation to work on the interplay of
language, language disorders, bilingualism and multilingualism, the willingness
to invest in interdisciplinary collaboration, and the ability to work in teams.
Candidates should have a strong publication track record.

HOW TO APPLY

Candidates should send their application by JUNE 15th,
2014. To submit your application please sign into the system and upload:

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Blog Moderators

Greg Hickok is Professor of Cognitive Sciences at UC Irvine, Editor-in-Chief of Psychonomic Bulletin & Review, and author of The Myth of Mirror Neurons. DavidPoeppel, after several years as Professor of Linguistics and Biology at the University of Maryland, College Park, is now Professor of Psychology at NYU. Hickok and Poeppel first crossed paths in 1991 at MIT in the McDonnell-Pew Center for Cognitive Neuroscience where Hickok was a post doc, and Poeppel a grad student. Meeting up again a few years later at a Cognitive Neuroscience Society Meeting in San Francisco, they began a collaboration aimed at developing an integrated model of the functional anatomy of language. Research in both the Hickok and Poeppel labs is supported by NIDCD.